In conversation with India Real Time, historian Narayani Gupta takes us on a visual journey of Delhi, as part of our series on the city. The first stop is Chandni Chowk in the second half of the 19th century – long before New Delhi was even conceived. Chandni Chowk, or moonlight square, was the city’s main bazaar and cultural hub.

Old Delhi’s most famous avenue is now layered with haphazard building extensions and a thick netting of electricity cables, resembling little what it once was – but it remains one of the city’s most vibrant commercial hubs. Edited excerpts.

So what’s going on in this picture?

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As you can see this is suspiciously empty. I can’t imagine it looked like this, with three men standing in the middle. Photographs took a long time to complete so I think there was time for the photographer to decide how many people he wanted in the picture and then have them pose for it. The left side of the street was narrower than the right side. This is because the right side was for vehicles and the left for pedestrians. But what I also want to point out is that the street looks incredibly wide compared to how it looks today. The reason is that all these awnings on the sides have now become extensions of buildings. So the width of the street has become much narrower.

The second thing is that all those lovely trees you see down the middle giving such nice shade – you can see a bunch people sitting underneath them- they’re all gone. This is because in 1912 there was an attempt to pitch a bomb against the governor general during a state procession. The British got so paranoid, like modern security officials, they decided to cut down all the trees. They suspected that whoever had thrown the bomb had been hiding in a tree. He wasn’t, actually, he was sitting on one of the upper floors of a bank on the other side.

Will Davies

Chandni Chowk today.

Will Davies

The old buildings that line Chandni Chowk are today layered with modern extensions and signboards.

The other thing that has gone from Chandni Chowk is that down the middle of it, there was a canal. It was part of the original design of Shah Jahan’s city and it brought water from quite far off from the river Yamuna. It came down to the city and sent out tendrils all over, which then converged at the Red Fort — where the king lived — flowed through it and out of the back. One of the canals ran through Chandni Chowk. The trees next to the canal offered shade and a place to sit and therefore this is where people gathered. It was more like the parks of Europe.

The people gathering in Chandni Chowk were basically all men because women were hardly to be seen outside till the 1930s. In the 1950s, more could be seen and today many more. But initially, this was a male space.

What kind of shops were there?

Very mixed. This is a typical street bazaar that you have in Indian cities. There were shops and offices. People like money lenders or lawyers all had chambers here. Off the street there were little lanes, which often were specialized trades. There was one lane of goldsmiths, another of embroiders, another of bangle sellers and so on.

Indian shops generally didn’t bother to invite you in, the shop just looked like a dark space. You had to know what you wanted and go there for it – the whole process was rather slow. You didn’t go and point at something. You went there, you sat down, you had a glass of water, you talked to the shopkeeper and he would slowly produce what he had to offer and then a long conversation would follow. Europeans always used to complain that the display was very boring because that was not their way of selling.

What impact did the building of New Delhi have on Old Delhi?

None whatever. What I mean is that they did not lose customers, no way – no more than how malls today have reduced the customers of the little bazaars. If you look at the names of the owners of many shops in New Delhi at Connaught Place, you will find the same ones in Old Delhi. They were opening new shops in Connaught Place but the parent branch of their shops was in Chandni Chowk.

Julian Finney/Getty Images

Electricity cables hang over an alley in present-day Old Delhi.

What are the biggest differences between Old Delhi then and now?

Today, many people are moving out of Chandni Chowk, there are less people living there now than there used to. In the picture, people would be living in the upper storeys. That has changed. Many people are selling out and going out to live in more open suburbs.

So the character is changing: it is becoming more and more commercial with less people living there – which is a great pity, because the mix was what was nice about it. In the evening, you get crowds of shoppers, you don’t get residents going out for walks.

The cables, well – we all know what that is about. People didn’t have electricity connections and sorted it out on their own. Indians are the most resourceful people in the world in this sense.

There is a palace, which you can’t see in this picture, which belonged to Begum Samru. She used to entertain Indian and English grandees, she was very queenly indeed. Today, that palace is a building with over 80 shops in it and the biggest electrical market in the whole of North India. Anyone who wants to buy electrical fittings for their house just comes straight to the Begum’s palace, and gets everything at a fraction of the price.

Chandni Chowk has lost its cultural appeal. But shopping there is as brisk as ever. It’s just changing, it’s becoming more modern.

Narayani Gupta is a historian who has written extensively about Delhi. The picture she discusses with us comes from “Delhi Then & Now” (Roli Books, 2008), which she co-authored.

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India Real Time offers analysis and insights into the broad range of developments in business, markets, the economy, politics, culture, sports, and entertainment that take place every single day in the world’s largest democracy. Regular posts from Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires reporters around the country provide a unique take on the main stories in the news, shed light on what else mattered and why, and give global readers a snapshot of what Indians have been talking about all week. You can contact the editors at indiarealtime(at)wsj(dot)com.